15 miles was never so sweet

photo:from left, Steve, Myself, Sophorn after glorious victory

It wasn't easy running 15 miles today, but it was pretty close. When we woke up this morning, neither my wife nor I had much doubt that we were gonna get it done, the question was, how was it going to feel.

The 15 mile course was out and back which is my favorite. I don't like going a little out and then a little back a bunch of times, I prefer to know that when I run 7.5 out, I HAVE TO run the 7.5 back. It provides me no opportunities to quite. And a straight out and back creates a mini achievement just getting to the turn around.

We also got a nice treat too as we saw Steve pull into the parking lot for the first time in 3 weeks. He seems to have the same pace as my wife and I and is good company. He started out with us and ended up doing the whole run with us. Because of our success at running last week's 12 miles at a set pace, we decided to do it again this week. In fact, that's how we're going to finish up our long run training. Go out steady, do NOT go out fast, and try to carry a steady pace through the entire run. Although last week we hit our stride at a 10:30 mile, this week we started out at an even 10. It helped that the temperature, at 72 degrees, almost felt chilly which is a change from last week when it felt a lot hotter.

Neither me, nor Steve, nor Sophorn had run 15 miles before, EVER. This was definitely a test day. The most Sophorn and I had done was 13.1 at last year's Philadelphia Half Marathon and I recall Steve saying the most he had done was 12. It really felt right today, pretty smooth, good conversation, and we kept the pace steady at 10 minute miles. There wasn't any talk of "this is real hard", "i don't know if I can do this". It was all just happening. I can't really recall either of my two partners in much distress, maybe three times we called "walkies" but never walked for that long, maybe an eighth of a mile, then just back at it.

Of course I hit my normal walls, where I had to beg my body just to move a step. That's normal, I've been there before, it's just something to push through. I had posted a part of Rudyard Kipling's poem "If" on Phorn's Facebook wall before we left, and part of it became my mantra during the run:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

I kept OCDing the "sixty seconds worth of distance run" in my head over and over as I hit pushed through my walls at 5 and 11 miles. My body wants to slow down for longer than 60 seconds though. More like 5 minutes at a time.

Today was the first time I ran with Gatorade. Usually I just go with water but on these longer runs I've been craving Gatorade at the finish so I just thought I'd indulge. That seemed to keep me more refreshed and I'm planning on continuing the practice. I run with the Nathan Quick Draw, which holds 22 ounces. I drank it all by the time we hit 9 miles so I made a pit stop at the Wawa at 3rd Ave and Ridge Pike in Collegeville to get a replacement after our turn around at around the 10 mile mark. It wasn't in the plan and I handed the cashier the sweatiest $20 dollar bill ever, next time I'll put the bill in a zip lock bag because sweaty dollars seem a breach of all kinds of etiquette. I don't think I could have made it all the way without refueling but it didn't occur to me until we were actually doing the miles so I fell into some luck today. I hope we do out and backs on our 17 and 21 mile runs because I don't plan on buying a backpack.

I also had to GU gel twice for the first time. My strategy is to just go with what it says on the packet, 15 before your next 45(so every 60 minutes before the finish). And I count backwards 6 miles(cause we were doing 10 minute miles) and took one at 3 and 9 miles. It used to taste just awful but I drink some water first and now it's quite appetizing on the runs.

We cruised though the later miles and we were all feeling good, I think when Steve's GPS watch beeped 12 miles and announced that every step was his new personal record, that fueled our small band of runners so the last three miles melted away. It felt really good, we were all proud of ourselves, and at ten minute miles at that. I even made us camera phone picture the moment. This was a cool day.

We'll be doing 17 miles in two weeks. I hope it stays cool. I hope we stay swift.

On a side note, my right toe is still doing it's little numbing/tingling thing, it doesn't get that bad, and it's definitely not getting worse. I'm pretty comfortable with it now and don't think I'm doing further damage, although it does keep me from pushing myself, which is probably a good thing.

My name is Jim and my wife and I are training for our first marathon. Here's all my training posts to date.